It’s a wonderful afterlife: Smart, funny Upload is a sheer delight

Enlarge / Nathan (Robbie Amell) is impressed with the digital afterlife service so far on Upload, now streaming on Amazon Prime. (credit: YouTube/Amazon Studios)

A cocky tech-bro discovers that living forever in a digital afterlife isn't quite the paradise he'd envisioned in Upload, a new comedy series from Amazon Prime Video. When the trailer first dropped in March, I pointed out the strong The Good Place vibes, which set a very high bar for any new comedy dealing with the afterlife. Fortunately, Upload is a sheer delight in its own right: smart, funny, warm-hearted, and perfectly paced, trading in The Good Place's witty takes on moral philosophy for more of an emphasis on class-based social hierarchies.

(Some spoilers below.)

Series creator Greg Daniels-best known for his work on The Office, Parks and Recreation, and King of the Hill-purportedly came up with the concept many years ago while working as a staff writer on Saturday Night Live, although Amazon didn't green-light the pilot until 2017, ordering a full ten-episode series the following year. It definitely has something of that Parks and Recreation vibe. Per the official premise: "In the near future, people who are near death can be 'uploaded' into virtual reality environments. Cash-strapped Nora works customer service for the luxurious 'Lakeview' digital afterlife. When party-boy/coder Nathan's car crashes, his girlfriend uploads him into Nora's VR world."

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